The Pan African Film Festival is open for film submissions for Feb. 12-22, 2015, in Los Angeles . The Pan African Film Festival is the largest and most prestigious black film festival in the U.S. The festival will last for eleven days and attracts more than 40,000 attendees, and screens more than 150 films from countries around the world such as Brazil, Kenya, Mexico, South Africa, Nigeria and Angola. The diversity of PAFF represents the core value of Pan-Africanism in every feature selected and its community programming, including a fine art show and surrounding schools’ Black History Month curriculum.
“Through the years, our guiding principle of ‘Pan-Africanism’ as a movement remains to unify and provide a platform for the meaningful stories of all people of African descent worldwide — African American, Caribbean, European, Latin American, South Pacific and aboriginal,” says Asantewa Olatunjisaid, director of programming for PAFF.
“Any film from anywhere with a synopsis from Africa and the Diaspora is eligible. The perspective must be realistic and reflect the black experience. Our time is now, our stories are prime, and support of authenticity is vital,” says Ayuko Babu, the executive director and one of the founders of PAFF.
These are guidelines on submitting films and videos made by and/or about people of African descent. Films need not be of African or African American descent to submit. The films should depict positive and realistic images and can be of any genre, drama, comedy, horror, adventure, animation, romance, science fiction, experimental, etc. Features and shorts, both narrative and documentary may be submitted. The film festival will accept a single submission of a work in progress; however, the final version of the film must be completed no later than Dec. 1, 2014. Submissions must be made online through the PAFF website www.paff.org. Click the submit to PAFF 2015 button. Submissions will be accepted now through Oct. 19 and late submissions Oct. 20 – Nov. 19; each have different rates, so get your submission in now.
